Tag Archives: Mystic Aquarium
Mystic Aquarium (the Whale People) expands offshore wind exhibit with youth in mind
In light of New London’s growing offshore wind industry, the Mystic Aquarium expanded its Renewable Ocean Energy Exhibit to educate the region on protective ocean wildlife methods this week. The expansion is in collaboration with Ørsted and Eversource, two developers of Connecticut’s first large-scale offshore wind farm. The offshore wind projects are expected to power up to 70,000 homes on Long Island when completed. The two companies gave the aquarium two grants totaling $1.25 million to study the effects of wind turbines on marine mammals and sea turtles. more, >>click to read<< 12:21
Status Check: Assessing Stellwagen National Marine Sanctuary
A submerged extension of the sandy Cape tip, it is a big sandbar rising from the ocean floor to the height of an 11-story building, coming within 65 feet of the ocean surface. Currents swirl around it, lifting organic debris from the ocean bottom up into the sunlit surface waters, kick-starting the marine food chain with plankton blooms that feed grazers like herring and sand lance that are in turn preyed upon by larger fish, whales and seabirds. But, as a new report by the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary shows, human activities in the ocean continue to increase, putting greater pressure on wildlife and habitat within the sanctuary as humans create an increasingly industrialized ocean that is noisier, more contaminated and overfished. (overfished by whom?!)>click to read< 07:33
The High-Stakes Battle Over Obama’s Atlantic Ocean National Monument
Mining and drilling for oil are already banned in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, established by former president Barack Obama in 2016 as the first marine monument in the Atlantic Ocean, 150 miles off the coast of Cape Cod. Within five years, too, all commercial fishing will be phased out – or, at least that was the plan. A federal judge is now weighing the fate of those protections in a lawsuit originally filed in March 2017 by a coalition of New England fishing groups – and it has led to a rare case of President Donald Trump defending his predecessor’s authority. >click to read<10:27
Storm brews over Maine’s monument offshore, too
Zinke has recommended that the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument – a 4,913-square-mile area of underwater canyons, thousand-year-old coral forests, and volcanic mountains on and beyond the southern edge of Georges Bank at the mouth of the Gulf of Maine – be opened to commercial fishing, a move proponents say would defeat its purpose.,, The heads of eight of the nation’s fisheries management councils – the industry-led bodies that implement fisheries regulations in federal waters – were already on record against the commercial fishing restrictions.,, Peter Shelley of the Conservation Law Foundation, an environmental attorney who is watching the case closely, strongly disagrees. click here to read the story 08:35
Photo-Op Politician to speak Tuesday on New England Coral Canyons and Seamounts designation
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-
ENGO., will speak Tuesday night about the effort to designate the New England Coral Canyons and Seamounts area as the nation’s first Marine National Monument in the Atlantic Ocean at Mystic Aquarium. Also speaking will be the aquarium’s Senior Research Scientist Peter Auster, who is among those trying to convince President Obama to make the designation before leaving office. There will also be a question-and-answer session followed by a reception with complimentary hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar. The event will be held from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Those wishing to attend the event should RSVP Dale Wolbrink at [email protected] or (860) 694-9011. Link 13:12
By the Numbers – Forum convinces many commercial fishing is sustainable
Those attending the forum, sponsored by The Providence Journal, Leadership Rhode Island, Rhode Island College and the Mystic Aquarium, were given electronic remote controls that allowed them to vote anonymously on multiple-choice questions. At the start of the program, 69 percent of audience members said commercial fishing is sustainable. At the end, that had risen to 78 percent. When broken down by groups, 88 percent of the people who said they were in the industry also said that the industry should regulate fishing, while 35 percent of recreational fishermen agreed, as did 43 percent of the people who identified themselves as consumers of fish. Read the rest here 07:41
